Miss Tyrrell couldn’t believe it. She urged her companions to recall everything that looked like corroborative evidence, and even then cried skeptically,
“But are you sure? May he not have taken on something else?”
Miss Latour didn’t think so. She had the news on pretty good authority. She regretted, however, to have caused Miss Tyrrell such acute distress, and hoped the report might be incorrect.
“Although I doubt it,” she said. “Colonel Mayhew told me that they were going back to England.”
“I had no idea they were such great friends of yours, Lily,” whispered Miss Mabel Angus-McCallum. “In most quarters they were not very popular.”
“Friends?” echoed Miss Tyrrell, indignantly. “They were no friends of mine, I assure you!”
“Then why—” began the other three “—why are you so upset by hearing that he’s lost his job?”
“Because,” answered Miss Tyrrell. “I was afraid it wasn’t so!”
Several rows behind them, Azalea Deane sat crushed against the ample folds of Miss Leila Brant. She had refused to accompany Marjorie Dilling, despite the latter’s threat that she would stay at home rather than go alone.
“I know you are not serious,” returned Azalea, in her gently insistent way, “for, of course, you should be there. A special seat will be reserved for you, and you must pretend to enjoy hob-snobbing with the notables.”